


Always Home

by AmazingGraceless



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Canon-Compliant, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Sort Of, mentions of physical and emotional abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-05
Updated: 2020-07-05
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:13:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28050708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmazingGraceless/pseuds/AmazingGraceless
Summary: Sirius shows up one night on James’ doorstep during the summer between sixth and seventh year.
Relationships: Sirius Black & James Potter
Kudos: 3





	Always Home

**Author's Note:**

> TW: There are mentions of the physical and emotional abuse Walburga and Orion put Sirius through, but I don’t go into much detail. Another Quidditch League entry from the competition on FFNet. This time, the prompt was to write a platonic relationship between James and Sirius specifically.

It was 11:47 at night when there was a knock on the door of the Potter residence. James Potter knew this with absolute certainty because of the clock that hung in his childhood room over his desk. He'd fumbled with his glasses for an embarrassingly long amount of time as the knocking grew louder. Because of the dark rainy night peeking through his drawn curtains, he'd checked the time, incredulous that anyone who was not a vampire or Remus Lupin would be up at this hour.

He located his wand and his cloak of invisibility far quicker. It seemed that adding his glasses did improve his vision tremendously.

As he stomped down the staircase lined with portraits of Potters past, he wondered why there wasn't a spell to get around this glasses nonsense. It was so very irritating, having moments in the day when he could not see— and therefore made locating the cure to that ailment all the more difficult. Especially when there were visitors in the night, a bitter part of him crumbled.

The knocking grew louder, more desperate. James drew his wand— a more pragmatic part of him wondered why his parents had not yet awakened to the sound of their surprise midnight guest. They were, to put it lightly, very very old, and as a result woke up whenever James so much as snored funny in his sleep.

A tremor of fear shot through his spine as he unbolted the door and turned the handle. But he ignored it— someone was outside and he was going to find out who.

" _Lumos_." His wand tip lit up to reveal none other than Sirius standing on the front porch. He was a sorry sight, especially in such a mixed neighborhood as Godric's Hollow. He was dressed in obvious wizard clothes, a trunk at his side and an open wound on his forehead. The rain plastered his black hair to the aristocratic features of his face, giving him the look of a wet dog.

It was fitting, James supposed as he took in the sight of his friend for a moment.

"So, Prongs, are you going to let me in or not?" Sirius smiled sheepishly— something James wasn't previously sure Sirius was capable of. It would require him to drop his ego for five minutes.

"Right." Getting him out of the rain, that was clearly the first thing he needed to do, all questions could come later.

He stepped aside, letting Sirius into the house. He stayed on the welcome mat, however, not wanting to spill water elsewhere.

James closed the door and looked his best friend up and down. "What the hell happened to you?"

Sirius rolled his eyes. "Such language— shouldn't your parents be down here any minute?"

"Mate, you picked the night when they're sleeping like the grave." A fleeting panic crossed James's mind— they weren't, were they—

Then the two boys listened carefully and were met with the sound of Euphemia and Henry Potter trying to outsnore each other in a battle that drowned out the sound of the falling rain.

"Sorry about them," James said. "But seriously— what happened? Do you know what time of night it is?"

"According to my watch it is—" Sirius glanced at the polished watch on his wrist that already had a crack on the otherwise pristine watch glass— "11:51."

"Close enough." James sighed. "Let me guess— your parents again?"

Sirius's usual facade of fun-loving and thrill seeking and pure charisma cracked. There was a vulnerability in how he was looking at James now— the realization of what had just happened. James knew it well— it was the look on Sirius's face when he had directed Snivellus towards Remus during the full moon—

"They— they kicked me out." He sounded breathless, and for a moment, he looked rather faint. "They finally did what they've been threatening, all these years. Didn't think Mum was serious— but she blasted me off the family tree and everything. Threw her best china at me, too when I wouldn't move fast enough."

He then attempted a charming smile as he brushed his hair out of his face. "I'm not bleeding too badly, eh?"

"I'll go get the bandages," James decided. "Mum keeps them in the rabbit hutch in the kitchen— I'll get some towels, too, or else you'll flood the floor. Just stay there."

Sirius looked for a moment if he were about to protest, to argue, to be his usual belligerent self. But then he closed his mouth, looking rather small as he set down the suitcase. But there was relief there, too. That there was a safe place to go.

James nodded in satisfaction, and hurried down the corridors of the Potter manor, navigating as quickly as humanly possible in the dark. He knew that his best friend had never gotten along with his parents— in fact, that in and of itself was an understatement. Sirius was even plotting his escape for when he was seventeen.

But no one had thought it would go _this_ far.

In fact, with the way Sirius had treated his head wound, James realized there was a lot that Sirius had not told him about his home life.

How stupid he must've sounded, whenever he did complain about a rule or outdated notion of his parents'! He knew he got along with his mum and dad far better, but he hadn't realized that Sirius was so far from what he and the other boys were like at Hogwarts.

The seconds turned to minutes that felt like hours as he rifled through the old rabbit hutch where Euphemia kept the healing supplies— leftovers from her time as a nurse in St. Mungo's during the Second World War and the Grindelwald War.

When he returned, he tossed the towels to Sirius, who immediately got to work drying his hair.

James hesitated— should he try to use the healing supplies?

" _MUM_!"

Sirius jumped, and snapped a finger in his right ear. "Oy! Did you have to be so loud?"

"Mum's going to be able to help you better than I could," James said. "Besides, we'll need to talk about where you're going to stay."

Here was where Sirius looked nervous. "Are you sure they'd take me? Maybe I'd be better off at my Uncle Algie's, or the Leaky Cauldron—"

James clapped a hand on his friend's shoulder. "You're my best mate. You'll always have a home here. Besides—" here his hazel eyes twinkled— "I always wanted a brother and a friend."


End file.
